Nursing a newborn: Why I quit breastfeeding my son

I post a lot of happy photos and funny stories on social media about being a new mom. For the most part, the experience is beautiful and exciting. I love everything about his soft little face, his silly baby noises, and his tiny feet. Everything he does is adorable. But let’s be clear about something; there are many moments that do not make the social media highlight reel. Behind the scenes, life with a new baby is unbelievably hard. I am talking about really effing emotionally hard. Hard on the body and hard on the soul. For me, the greatest challenge has been nursing. Breastfeeding was not at all what I expected. In fact, I hated the whole experience so much that I quit.

I had always assumed I would nurse him. “It’s natural,” other nursing moms told me. It’s what good moms do to nourish their babies, right? And so within moments after coming into the world, this brand new baby was placed on my chest where he immediately began to nurse. I remember thinking to myself, So this is it? Just like that? I can totally do this! I had absolutely no idea what I was doing! A hospital lactation consultant visited my room and gave me some pointers and a few brochures on feeding positions, but I still felt confused. Also, nursing began to hurt terribly, and I began to dread doing it. How did I know if he was getting enough? The anxiety was overwhelming. Other people have told me that even when done correctly, nursing still hurts. One friend told me to keep pushing through the pain no matter what. This statement reminded me of a fitness instructor who once told me “no pain, no gain” when I told him that I had pulled a muscle and couldn’t do a specific exercise. I hate that mentality. Discomfort is one thing. Pain is another. Call me crazy, but I am not a big fan of injuries, especially to intimate parts of my body. Childbirth was excruciating enough. Why self-impose additional trauma on my body? There was a perfectly reasonable alternative, but I felt like I couldn’t and shouldn’t consider it. Not the F word. I was overwhelmed with shame at the idea of using formula. What would people think? Other moms told me how much of a bonding experience nursing would be, but how could I focus on bonding when I felt like someone was ripping my skin off? I didn’t find nursing to be a magical experience. Did that make me some kind of psychopath who couldn’t bond with her baby? I felt deeply connected to him every time I looked into his beautiful blue eyes, but I didn’t experience that connection through nursing. For me, the connection felt strong and beautiful through bottle feeding. He was still in my arms and he was still being fed. Most importantly, we were both more relaxed. I didn’t need him physically attached to me to feel the closeness, although I certainly understand why people do. Nevertheless, I powered through for a few days and tried to absorb all the advice around me. If this is natural I should be able to do it and I should give it all my effort. I was warned about cracked and chapped nipples, but this was so much worse than I prepared for. I was literally bleeding. I had scabs forming. My nipples looked like my knees when I used to fall down roller-skating on my driveway when I was a kid. No wonder I received so many little tubes of nipple cream as gifts! No amount of nipple cream made it feel better. How the hell can women do this long term? Do they have nipples made of steel?

I googled as much information as I could and sought comfort from other nursing moms, but I was still miserable. I decided to consider other options. I previously ordered a free breast pump from my insurance company, and opted to give it a try. If you’ve never pumped or seen a breast pump work, it’s pretty wild. It basically turns you into a human milk factory as you sit topless (or wearing one of the special bras/nursing tank tops) extracting milk from your breasts every 2-3 hours. The dripping sound as it fills the little cup reminds me of a Starbucks espresso machine. It’s a fascinating process, but also sort of strange to watch. Milk can drip out of the flange and the parts need to be cleaned after each use. It gets on your body and also on your clothes, a sticky feeling which made me want to shower. You have to wear these little pads inside your bra to absorb any leakage and prevent wet spots on your shirt. I don’t know about other women, but wearing a pad for weeks after giving birth was enough padding for me. Couldn’t I have at least one intimate part of my body that wasn’t under attack? For my own sanity, I needed some part of myself to be recognizable. At first, I enjoyed pumping and found it empowering. I loved watching the cup fill up because I could literally see the fruits of my labor. I felt accomplished each time I filled the little storage bottles and lined them up in my refrigerator like trophies. This feeling lasted about a week. I quickly realized that pumping required a very rigid schedule. It’s a supply and demand system so you must continue to pump at regular intervals (every few hours) in order to maintain adequate milk supply. This sounded much easier in my mind than it was to actually maintain. The first few days I binged several seasons of Blue Bloods and parked myself on the couch pumping away every 2-3 hours, even in the middle of the night with my eyes half closed. It didn’t hurt thankfully. However, as long as I continued to pump, I could never sleep more than a few hours at a time. How is that sustainable? If you want to see me at my worst, take away my sleep for a week. It is not pretty.

I know it seems like a radical idea, but what if I wanted to actually sleep through the night and let my husband handle the bottles? What if I wanted to leave the house for more than a few hours? I had absolutely no interest in ‘car pumping’ which I am told involves plugging the machine into the cigarette lighter of your car. The turning point came when one morning I woke up after (over)sleeping 6 hours (unheard of for new moms and only made possible by my husband sharing in the feeding) and my shirt was soaked. I finally felt well-rested, but I also felt as though my body was punishing me for choosing to sleep. Had I made a selfish choice? I immediately tried to pump to relieve the pressure, but I couldn’t get anything to come out. How could this be? I remember getting into a hot shower as the online experts advised and trying to express milk with my hand. Not exactly a relaxing way to shower, but I tried until the water eventually turned cold. An hour later, I still couldn’t pump and I was starting to go into panic mode. Was my body broken? Had it turned on me? I was supposed to meet a friend for lunch and I began sobbing as I texted her to cancel. There was no way I could go anywhere like this. I was literally a leaking faucet and yet unable to pump a single drop. I was a mess in every sense of the word. I sat there wearing these weird silicone suction cups called haakas which catch the milk. Someone in an online nursing group suggested this and it seemed to help. After about 15 minutes, one fell off and spilled all over the carpet. What kind of mind-fuck was this? I burst into tears. Turns out you can cry over spilled milk. I felt completely hopeless and miserable. Something had to change or I was going to lose my mind. I sent a lot of frantic texts to my husband that day that I hope he later deleted. This wasn’t the strong Tasha I used to recognize in the mirror.

I reached out to a close friend who had a similar unpleasant experience nursing, and I felt a wave of relief all down my body when she told me that she had transitioned to formula. I finally felt like I could give myself permission to do the same. It’s sad that at 37 years old I needed outside validation to make a choice about my own life and my own body, but I did. Knowing that a trusted friend made a similar choice helped me feel safe. She and I talked openly about the importance of prioritizing our own mental health and by the end of the conversation, I felt like I was no longer alone. There were plenty of moms out there who struggled with nursing. I wasn’t the only person to “fail.” We couldn’t all be bad moms, right? I learned from other friends that many of them didn’t enjoy nursing at all and stopped after a short time. Other friends had no issues whatsoever and enjoyed every minute. Others never even considered it and went straight to formula. While everyone’s experiences were unique, the common denominator is that every baby was perfectly healthy and happy with either formula or breastmilk. Later that same day, I finally decided to give myself a break and introduce formula. I breathed another sigh of relief when my husband came home, wiped away my tears and helped me make my first formula/breastmilk combo bottle. And just like that, my sweet little guy took the bottle with ease. He didn’t fuss. If he could talk, he would have said, “we got this, mama.” Part of me believes he heard me crying and cut me some slack. He seemed to really enjoy his first formula bottle before drifting off into a delightful slumber.

It’s been 2 weeks since I introduced formula and scaled back on pumping. I finally feel like I can breathe. I no longer feel like a prisoner tied to a machine by a cord so short I literally can’t move off the couch. My body feels like it belongs to me again and I’ve been able to exercise without feeling pain in my breasts. As for the baby, he hasn’t noticed the change at all. He is happy, healthy and thriving. I am confident no one will ask him if he was formula fed or breast fed when he applies to college. Or ever.

I took a risk in sharing this personal experience with the world. I wrote on this particular topic because women experience shame in all aspects of their lives, not just breastfeeding. We are taught to feel shame about our life choices, our careers, our bodies and our parenting. The worst part is that much of that shaming comes from other women. Does anyone truly have a definite answer as to which feeding method is ‘best’? No. We all just think we do. We use our own experiences as facts. We believe our way is the right way. We find research online that supports our views and for some people, this is gospel. But my decision is one that worked for the baby AND for me. In order for me to be a mentally strong mom, I needed control of my body again. This choice allowed me physical freedom, but most importantly mental freedom. I haven’t felt nearly as stressed as I did when I was forcing myself to pump around the clock. I am grateful there are other options out there. Yes, I could have hired an expensive lactation consultant. I briefly considered it, even though it didn’t feel right. Maybe I would have learned to love breastfeeding. Or not. But the truth is, I had no interest in hiring someone to help me nurse. I knew in my heart what the right decision was for us. It’s amazing how that little voice inside you is sometimes the best compass you can have. Did I take the easy road? Did I quit? Does it matter? Depends on who you ask. But I am only concerned with us. I not only considered his needs, but also my own needs as his mother. And one of those needs just happened to be making it through the day without ugly-crying from stress. This decision means that my husband can also share in feeding him, and he can bond with him in a way that would not exist if I was exclusively nursing. I prefer this type of shared partnership and frankly, sometimes I need to sleep! He is more than capable of handling the midnight shift from time to time. Moms can’t and shouldn’t do it all. I try to remind myself that my decision does not make me selfish. In fact, just the opposite is true. The world tells us as women to sacrifice our bodies and our lives for our families. The expectation is not even remotely the same for men. I love my child more than anything. I do not love him more if I breastfeed and less if I use formula. I love him enough to make the best decisions that work for us both. If I gave every ounce (no pun intended) of myself and to my child, I would be depleted emotionally and physically. He might get plenty of breast milk, but he would not get the best version of me. Don’t we both deserve the best version of me?

My nursing experience reminds me of the familiar saying, “You can’t pour from an empty cup.” Or as I like to joke, you can’t milk an empty breast. ;)